Yet if it is a scena, then there is no definable plot: the texts I've chosen to set are not narratives, but highly complex and elusive poems. Consequently I'm not sure - since, at the time of writing this note, I'm too close still to the piece to look at it objectively - if I can be more specific about the overall theme, other than using the imprecise words, change and transience.

 

Two poems by Eugenio Montale (1896 -1981) are the centre of the work, both coming from his first published collection of 1925: 'Crisalide' (Chrysalis) and 'Casa sul mare' (House by the sea). The first of these is set in the original Italian, the second in the fine English translation by Jonathan Galassi. They are framed by two epigrammatic fragments from the French poems Rilke wrote towards the end of his life (coincidentally also from around 1925). I hope that these difficult and dense texts can be left to speak for themselves, and that I can be forgiven for not trying to interpret them other than through their setting.

 

The instrumental 'interludes' - although calling them that belies the fact that they carry equal musical weight - come at the end of 'Crisalide': a turbulent continuation of the poem, spilling over into a sombre postlude; and before the final stanza of 'Casa sul mare' - an almost funeral-march like interruption of the poem. The closing Rilke epigram echoes the opening: just as a continuum has no end, so the work spirals back to its beginning. 

 

Colin Matthews

 

‘Much of the setting is displayed against a lush instrumental backdrop full of incident and interest, with ghosts of French impressionism floating in the wings. The result is that the work is eminently approachable, for all the obscure imagery of the poems.’

The Daily Telegraph (Matthew Rye), 12 October 2000

 

'A remarkable new work … The opening stanzas of Montale’s 'Crisalide' elicit music of extraordinary subtlety, their rich and recondite imagery reflected in a languorous, exquisitely crafted canvas… Later, syncopations create a marvelous dragging effect and the scoring becomes ever more dazzling as the work proceeds to its close.”

The Times (Barry Millington), 16 October 2000

 

‘A fecund vision of musical continuity. The work’s structure is striking. Two settings of poems by Montale, and two epigrams by Rilke, are disrupted and fused by instrumental sections in a continuous, 40-minute span… Matthews creates a kaleidoscope of skirling rhythmic impetus … an apparently definitive performance, balancing the beauty and expressiveness of Matthews’s soundworld.’

The Guardian (Tom Service), 12 October 2000

 

‘It matches the scale of a symphony or cantata, yet resembles neither… Matthews can handle grandeur and intimacy with equal skill.’
The Observer (Fiona Maddocks), 15 October 2000